Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday that Robert Mueller's Russia probe needed an interview with President Donald Trump to draw its conclusions and would issue a subpoena if necessary.
"I think they've reached a point where, very frankly, they're not going to be able to conclude this investigation without the testimony of the president of the United States," Panetta, who also served as CIA chief under President Barack Obama, told Wolf Blitzer on CNN.
"It would seem that if the president says he's done nothing wrong, there's no collusion, then you would think that the ability to speak the truth would make it easy for him to sit down and answer the questions of the special prosecutor."
Panetta's comments came after news reports Clinton impeachment lawyer Emmet Flood replaced the retiring Ty Cobb on the president's personal legal team — signaling a tougher approach to Mueller's investigation.
"If that is a problem, then his legal team is going to continue to put up a confrontation and challenge the approaches of the special prosecutor.
"But ultimately," Panetta told Blitzer, "they're playing a losing game.
"The courts will uphold the right of this special prosecutor to get this kind of very important testimony.
"One way or another, if the president wants this investigation to come to an end, it's only going to come to an end when the president testifies to the special prosecutor."
Panetta said Mueller would "try to do everything possible to work with the president's legal team, to see whether or not there is an approach that would be acceptable to them that would allow for the president to do this through some kind of agreement.
"He'll exhaust that effort.
"But, if in the end, they block him every step of the way, then there's no question in my mind that he will seek a subpoena," he said.
"The courts will uphold his right to seek that subpoena."
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